Snippets
by Fledgling
Summary: A collection of drabbles centering around the Inuyasha cast. Snippets, if you will. Ch.8: [MirokuxKagome: sneaky.]
1. Remember the flowers

Word count: 100  
Summary: He sees a flower. He remembers her. But…who is she?

_Remember the flowers_

Sesshomaru bent down close to the ground, his face placid and emotional as a clawed hand reached for a daisy. Halfway down, he froze, suddenly shooting sharp, alert glances around him. At seeing no one, however, the taiyoukai relaxed further, and gently plucked a swaying wildflower from the field. He stood up slowly.

Almost as if confused, a soft word reached his lips. "Rin," he said, frowning, a strange lack of hostility in the normally cold and fierce demon lord. Sesshomaru focused golden eyes on the flowers. Who was Rin? And why – pray tell – did she remind him of flowers?


	2. Unexpected

Word count: 200  
Summary: Protection...comes in many forms.

_Unexpected_

Rin yelped as a green snake slipped from the bushes and reared, hissing. It fixed livid eyes solely on the girl, and Rin shuddered as it slid closer, blending flawlessly into the emerald grass.

"Lord Sesshoumaru?" No answer returned her call, and Rin withdrew even more as the serpent continuously slithered her way, baring gleaming fangs. "Lord Jaken?"

As if on cue, there was a violent rustle from the grasses to her left, and a small toad marched out grumpily, globular eyes glaring at the snake. Jaken raised his staff threateningly, then poked the animal fiercely.

"You! Shoo!" he screeched, little body quivering. Almost immediately, the snake disappeared into the grass again, looking almost irritated as it went. Just as abruptly, Jaken turned to leave.

"Oh, thank you!" Rin cried, running up to the grumbling figure. Suddenly she stopped. "Lord Jaken," she questioned, "Did Lord Sesshoumaru want to see me?" For a moment, Jaken looked genuinely uncomfortable, and he refused to meet her eyes.

"No – yes! Yes! He did!"

Rin frowned at his strange reaction, but didn't comment. It had almost seemed…like Jaken had come to rescue her. She giggled. But that couldn't be true.

Protection...comes in many forms.


	3. Forever young

Word count: 200  
Summary: "Sesshoumaru knew things wouldn't be the same with her gone."

_Forever young_

Sesshoumaru knew things wouldn't be the same with her gone. Even though she was hardly a young girl when she left, he couldn't help but recall those moments when she had scampered round him in circles, flailing her arms wildly.

The worst part had been when she grew to look older than himself. That morning, when she'd awoken, gazing at him sleepily, Sesshoumaru had frozen to his spot. Her body and face…held the human stench of _age_. Seeing his strange, intense stare, she'd flushed, pulling her crude woolen robe tighter around her body.

Rejection. Rejection was the way. Pacing in a fit of invisible anger, he conjured those ever-immortal images of her youth.

Her smile, filled with broken teeth as she handed him tiny, unappetizing fish.

Her face, glowing with surprise and _life_ as she awoke to find herself in Sesshoumaru's arms, his mystical sword glowing blue.

Her lips, quivering with unvoiced joy as her small fingers stroked his white pelt.

Her eyes, brimming with fear and love as she gave Sesshoumaru the first hug he'd had in 500 years.

He closed his eyes. There. There she was to stay, frozen, timeless, memorized forever in his broken heart.


	4. Moment

Word count: 120  
Theme: Strength  
Summary: Rin's thoughts as she contemplates her own strength. Older!Rin. Light, mellow, and short.

A/N: I'm sorry, it's Rin again. Next drabble isn't about Rin, Sesshoumaru _or _Jaken, I promise.

_Moment_

I am lying in a bed of butterflies. They soar around me in impossible circles, dancing around my head and making my heart leap with joy.

I live; I taste; I love. I am weak, in a way, but I know I can never be strong like my lord is. I was killed by wolves and revived. I was shunned by fellow humans and forced to forage for food. I was captured by evil demons and used as bait. I was the first to melt an unforgiving heart; and yet last to receive care in return.

_To have lived through all that_, I think, smiling as I watch the perfect sapphire sky, _probably means I'm stronger than I once thought._


	5. Summer

Word count: 197  
Summary: At times, the simplest things are the deepest loss. A quick look inside Sango's heart. Don't be fooled by the title.

A/N: This was a drabble originally written as a response to a challenge, but was never submitted because I didn't think it suited the theme and was too short to have any real meaning. However, it became the precedent of "Only One Wish", a Sango introspective oneshot that is also posted at this account.

_Summer_

Sango hated summer.

_It's much too hot_, she said to Miroku. _That's why_.

And he wouldn't guess she was lying, so it was fine.

No one knew that Sango used to love the heat, the warmth, and the brilliant light that darkened her skin, pale from winter. She used to love splashing her face in the stream, and feel the icy water stream down her neck. Summer used to bring picnics, and celebrations, and Sango once swam and fished and spent blue-black evenings staring at bright shimmering stars, all the while snuggling beside Kirara's warmth and Kohaku's love.

But - and Sango knew it was mean and selfish of her - what was summer _now_ compared to what she _had_ with her family and friends?

To think that the only one left of her former life probably didn't even remember what summer was, and was confined to kill mindlessly each day, lost under an emotionless shell.

Sango had fallen down a waterfall, and she could never get back up. Each day, she drifted a little farther from shore.

_I never really liked summer_, Sango told Kagome. _I just don't_.

And who was to say that wasn't true?


	6. Upon the Wind

Word count: 241   
Theme: Gift   
Summary: (KaguraxKagome. Femmeslash, onesided.) "Sometimes the wind brings her gifts." Yet there's something special about her latest one...

_Upon the Wind_

Sometimes the wind brings her gifts. They are little things: feathers, trinkets, perhaps a bolt of pretty cloth she saw while flying on her feather.

"It is not my own doing," she says, gaze averted and one eyebrow raised. She tells Naraku the gifts are unexpected arrivals of the untamable wind, and that she does not, as his narrowed eyes whisper, manipulate anything. "They simply come," she says sharply, and Naraku, for once, says nothing in response.

This time, Kagura stands under the shelter of a great tree, feeling the earth pounding under her soles and the sunlight tracing out a pattern of gold-laced leaves on her back. Blood-red lips whisper to the wind, begging them to bring back her latest desire. It is rather different from what she usually wishes, and perhaps a little more difficult to obtain, but that makes no difference to the Wind Sorceress. Kagura has always enjoyed a good challenge.

The leaves sway and swish above her. Kagura's eyes widen as she sees someone stagger into view, the unconscious body supported only by a swirling, unsteady current of wind. She adjusts the angle of her fan, and the young miko of the future, Kagome, slumps to the ground, her soft, pale skin half-smothered by the dirt.

Kagura leans against the trunk of her tree, eyes unnaturally bright. She covers one eye slyly with her fan.

"Now this," she murmurs to herself, "is a gift I like."


	7. Silence

Word count: 225  
For tragicamente, 1 of 2 drabbles: Sesshoumaru/Older!Rin - _long; silent_

_Silence_

_Long was Sesshoumaru's hair; silent was his countenance._

That was what Rin had thought, long ago. He had been simple then, as simple as everything else in the world was: the grass under her feet, the shrill cries of the birds, the terrifying bliss of flying.

_Long was Sesshoumaru's face; silent was his heart._

That was what Rin realized as she grew older, slowly evolving into a womanhood that never quite fit. She ought to feel shame for wandering the forests like a little girl, barely clad and often filthy, but she didn't care. Her kimono, beautiful the first time Sesshoumaru brought it to her, was now brown, dry with failed expectations and unvoiced hopes.

_Long was Sesshoumaru's life; silent was his sorrow._

This is what Rin had learned. The hard way, she had to admit, as she lay in his tireless arms, wheezing with age and trying to wipe away her own girlish tears with a frail, wrinkled hand. She'd already lived longer than most. There were surprisingly few things she wanted to say to him, save one. One sentence, that, Rin was sure, he would not want to hear. Even on the brink of death, she knew her master well.

_Long was Rin's love; silent was her passing._

She never told him. But she loved him.

Silently watching her go, Sesshoumaru never asked.


	8. Cowardly Affections

Word count: 200

For tragicamente, 2 of 2: Mir/Kag, "sneaky"

_Cowardly Affections_

It was a love that snuck up on her.

Hard to say when it happened. All Kagome knew was that one morning she woke up, and found herself looking at Miroku instead of Inuyasha. The rest of that day was like a dream: when a demon leapt out of the bushes, hissing, she stared at Miroku, standing out of reach, rather than Inuyasha as he destroyed the reptile.

And then she was watching him. She noticed the way he looked at his right hand every morning, discovered that his eyebrows expressed his mood, and learned that he tended to chew with the left side of his jaw rather than the right. She watched his fingers, graceful and quick, and their cleanliness, even when they hadn't bathed in days.

Sneaks were hardly respectable. Her love-- infatuation, more like-- had no honour. It wasn't even brave enough to take her by the shoulders and shake her with its fire. It only watched, and observed, stealing glances whenever it could. Which was why Kagome couldn't take this seriously; even if she couldn't stop thinking about Miroku. What a cowardly affection; she had to ignore it.

Unfortunately, sneaky things were often persistent in nature.


End file.
